The Brave Pedestrian

Unlike the US justice system which has a "witness PROTECTION program", Indian judiciary has a "witness ELIMINATION program". Our courts systematically defeat the good intentions of witnesses, failing which they eliminate the witnesses themselves. They create conditions where witnesses are rewarded for turning hostile, and severely punished for being honest. At great personal risk and inconvenience, witnesses appear before the court in trials of murders or other serious offens es committed by rich and influential people (such as Salman Khan's hit-and-run case). But rather than recording the witnesses' statement at the earliest, judges mechanically give tareekh pe tareekh for many months and years... ... until the witnesses' finally stop being cooperative, or their memory fades, or they are intimidated and choose to keep quiet, or they sink into debt and financial distress, and stop coming to court, or they accept money to change their story, or ...

Unlike the US justice system which has a "witness PROTECTION program", Indian judiciary has a "witness ELIMINATION program". Our courts systematically defeat the good intentions of witnesses, failing which they eliminate the witnesses themselves. They create conditions where witnesses are rewarded for turning hostile, and severely punished for being honest. At great personal risk and inconvenience, witnesses appear before the court in murder trials or trials involving offense s committed by rich and influential people (such as Salman Khan's hit-and-run case). But rather than recording the witnesses' statement at the earliest, judges mechanically give tareekh pe tareekh for many months and years... until the witnesses' stop being cooperative, or their memory fades, or they are intimidated and choose to keep quiet, or they sink into debt and financial distress, and stop coming to court, or they accept money to change their story, or they are silen...